WVC 16 - 2 D- 5 A
§16-2D-5a. Exception permitting certain nursing beds.
(a) Notwithstanding any provision contained in this article
and any rule issued by the state agency, on and after the first day
of January, one thousand nine hundred ninety-nine, any critical
access hospital, designated by the state as a critical access
hospital after meeting all federal eligibility criteria, that was
previously a for-profit organization and which has been certified
as a not-for-profit organization within the five years prior to the
first month in which this section becomes effective, may apply for
a certificate of need to add up to twenty-five licensed distinct
part nursing beds for certification by both medicare and medicaid
for reimbursement purposes, if the hospital meets all federal and
state licensing requirements for the provision of nursing services,
and if the nursing beds created are located in distinct long-term
care units in a previously constructed part of the hospital
suitable for that purpose.

(b) Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, and
any rule issued by the state agency, any rural hospital that was
formerly owned and operated by the county but now is owned by a
nonprofit multi-hospital chain owning two or more rural hospitals,
that is eligible in the rural health plan for, but not currently
designated as, a critical access hospital and currently have one to
twenty-five nursing beds, may apply for a certificate of need to convert up to sixteen beds of existing licensed acute care beds to
nursing beds for certification by both medicare and medicaid for
reimbursement purposes, provided that the following conditions are
met:

(1) There is no overall increase in the bed capacity of the
hospital; one acute care bed is converted to one dually certified
medicare and medicaid nursing bed.

(2) All converted acute care beds shall be permanently deleted
from the acute care bed compliment of the hospital, which may not
thereafter add, by conversion or otherwise, acute care beds to its
bed compliment without satisfying the requirements of subdivision
(4), subsection (b), section three of this article, for which
purposes the addition, whether by conversion or otherwise, shall be
considered a substantial change to the bed capacity of the hospital
notwithstanding the definition of that term as found in subsection
(e), section two of this article.

(3) After the conversion, the hospital shall have no more than
fifty licensed acute care beds.

(4) The hospital shall meet all federal and state licensing
requirements for the provisions of skilled nursing services.
Additionally, all skilled nursing beds created under this exemption
shall be located in distinct long-term care units in a previously
constructed part of the hospital that can be used for that purpose.

(5) Nothing in this section negatively affects the rights of
inspection and certification which are elsewhere required by
federal law or regulations.

Note: WV Code updated with legislation passed through the 2015 Regular Session
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